The English media are reporting the Portuguese media reporting a last minute €40m/£34m Everton offer to sign Yacine Brahimi from FC Porto. Or rather, it may be the English media reporting from the Portuguese media who were in turn getting confused about a report from England.
It’s confusing stuff.
For the last month of the transfer window, Brahimi was available for the price of €40m. His release clause is €60m, but Porto were well aware they wouldn’t get that, and even €40m was felt to be a little too high.
Therefore, claims of a last minute €40m offer don’t match with that. It was something reported by A Bola a few days ago, but they’d got confused by a claim from The Mirror. The English newspaper rightly claimed Porto were demanding that figure, but A Bola got confused and said that Everton had actually made that offer. We covered it here.
The Mirror then did report, from reliable sources that Everton had made a €40m offer. Perhaps A Bola saw into the future.
Now there are new claims in the Portuguese media about a last minute €40m offer being made and rejected, which has ended up in England, via The Liverpool Echo, as Porto holding out for more.
Apparently Porto expected a larger offer from Everton’s local rivals Liverpool, possibly matching the €60m clause.
We’re almost 100% certain this is absolute nonsense and a mash of reports getting confused, Liverpool simply wouldn’t have gone close to €60m for Brahimi.
Whilst Porto may now try to talk up Brahimi’s value ahead of future windows, if Everton had offered €40m on Wednesday afternoon then, as earlier information would suggest, he’d have arrived at the club gift-wrapped.
There are differing claims on this one, with reliable sources convinced the bid was made, however, the club themselves pushed for a month than €40m was what they wanted.
